


Even for Us, There Will Be a Time to Love and a Time to Trust

by InsertSthMeaningful



Category: Captain America (Movies), X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, And Eeeverybody Huuurts, Awesome Howling Commandos, But they will get nice things, Captain America: The First Avenger, Fix-It, Gen, Holocaust Survivor Erik Lehnsherr, Mash-up, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, References to Holocaust, References to human experimentation, X-Men: First Class References, references to past abuse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-24
Updated: 2020-05-24
Packaged: 2021-03-02 21:40:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,281
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24353752
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InsertSthMeaningful/pseuds/InsertSthMeaningful
Summary: A mission takes Steve and his Howling Commandos to a laboratory near Auschwitz. There, they find a metal cube, and inside this metal cube is a boy with peculiar white hair for whom it takes a mere flick of his wrist to move Captain America's legendary vibranium shield.Of course, they can't just leave him there. And so it comes that Erik Lehnsherr finds a family in Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes - two super-soldiers whose fate he will change forever.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes & Erik Lehnsherr & Steve Rogers, James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers (background)
Comments: 30
Kudos: 54
Collections: X-Salon Challenge Works





	Even for Us, There Will Be a Time to Love and a Time to Trust

**Author's Note:**

> This is based on that one Bland Marvel Headcanon I can't find rn, about Bucky and Steve rescuing Erik from Schmidt. Also, it's my fill for X-Salon's Mash-Up May! Yay! Will probably write the next two parts towards the end of June.  
> Many thanks to [homosociality](https://archiveofourown.org/users/homosociality) for the beta! And thank you to all the enablers on the [Team Cherik](https://discord.gg/ntG8Q4F) and [X-Men X-Traordinaire](https://discord.gg/C8us79a) servers :3< you're the (best) worst <3

“Jeez. Looks like the rats have fled the sinking ship, Stevie.”

“ _Cap_ when we’re on duty, Sergeant Barnes,” Steve mumbles, all his attention dedicated to the mess they’ve walked into. “I guess we can blow this off. Doesn’t look like this covert weapon project still operates from here.”

There’s a crack and a grunt from behind him, then Dum Dum swearing mildly under his breath. He must’ve stepped into one of the Petri dishes strewn all over the floor, which is no surprise, given all the tables of the lab have been upended and the steel cabinets for the keeping of files tossed about in a wild array of destruction. The Nazi scientists who worked here before must’ve gotten the scent of the Howling Commandos’ impending arrival and cleared out in a hurry, neither caring to salvage much nor erase evidence of their experiments and results.

“Un moment, Capitaine,” Dernier intercepts to his left, kneeling beside a pile of ledgers, one open on his knees. He rifles through the pages, stopping every now and then to study them more closely with a frown creasing his forehead. “C’est marrant ça. On dirait qu’il y avait des expériences sur des hommes ici.”

A whole-body shudder grips Steve at the last sentence, even though he only knows a few swear words in French. Mustering his face into a calm expression, he edges closer to peer over his comrade’s shoulder, careful not to accidentally knock Jacques’ brains out with the edge of his shield. “Gabe. Tell me our Frenchman didn’t just find out they were conducting experiments on humans here.”

“Hate to disappoint you, Cap, but-” Gabriel Jones, his white teeth stark against his black smile as he grimaces and reads the German labels on a few bottles containing what must be chemical substances- “you heard right. Must be all sort of sick unholy things jotted down in those files. If you want me to translate them, I will, but one thing’s for sure: You won’t like my findings, even less ‘n me.”

Steve shakes his head wordlessly. _Not necessary._ There’s no need to amplify the horrors of the War once more. He sighs when he straightens up to survey the scene: Not much left to work with, in his opinion, so they might as well move out before the opposition finds the intruders in its territory. Though it irks him to leave this villa hidden in a copse of trees near Auschwitz just yet. Outside, the sky is drab and gray, hung with clouds which seem to not have moved an inch in the last fifteen minutes, and he knows that when they step over the threshold to move through the undergrowth of the forest to the abandoned dirt track where they left their army trucks, the _smell_ will return.

The sickly-sweet smell of death, of flesh that couldn’t decay but was shoved into the oven, of barely grown-back hair. On the other side of the front line, in the camps of the American army, he’s heard rumors of the snow around Auschwitz coming down gray in the winter. Gray from ash. Gray from the flesh of human beings.

He would be lying if he said it didn’t make him want to curl up and puke his guts out.

But as it is, their time is running out, and as much as he would like to storm the gates of the KZ and free the workers there, the Howling Commandos are a small squad, numbering barely ten members. They need to get out of here, without the super weapon promised by Stark, with empty hands, but at least still in possession of their lives.

He’s about to bellow out a corresponding command when he hears Bucky’s gasp from a few doors down the hall and James Falsworth – who’s usually never lacking a joke or two – lets out an aggravated, “Oh sweet Jesus.” With a few strides, he’s out of the room with the filing cabinets, down the corridor and at his fellow soldiers' sides.

At the sight in front of him, he lowers his shield he’s had cautiously held in front of his body and feels his jaw go slack.

Bucky to his left shows very much the same signs of disgusted surprise.

“Well, fellas,” Falsworth finally says, “looks like we at least found the place where this supposed super weapon was forged.”

It’s not a room. It’s an operating theater. No windows. The floor is tiled white, laid out with a light incline so its lowest point is in the middle, and the operating table over this pit looks much the same. The straps hanging from its edge are crusted over with layers of old blood, the leather scratched at places where the doctors’ victim – _or victims, countless ones_ , Steve can’t help thinking with dread settling in his stomach – must have been able to reach with their nails. On the walls surrounding the three men, instruments of medical torture are lined up neatly, polished blank and flawless, their bone-breaking blades shining in the cold light of the lamps humming quietly overhead.

But the most singular and fear-inducing feature in the surgical suite is not the heap of bloodied bandages Steve can’t help noticing have been discarded in a corner, or the dressing trolley with one single, strangely warped scalpel on its surface. No. What draws both his and Bucky’s gaze – the latter is just wetting his lips and Steve feels his cheeks warming but _Not now, Rogers, and certainly not here, do you have any idea how darned indecent that would be?_ -, what makes the blood run cold with uneasy foreboding, is a metal cube standing at the far wall they’re facing.

“That looks like a safe or something,” Bucky says, voice as subdued as Steve hasn’t heard him in a long time. This must be the ultimate flashback to his torture at the hands of Hydra’s scientists. Instinctively, he thinks about hugging his friend, or taking his hand and peppering kisses all over it, to squeeze some warmth back into his body – but he can’t. He’s got other duties right now.

“A darn big safe in my opinion,” he replies and gingerly stalks towards it, always on guard. Judging from its edge length, a short man could maybe stand or lay down in it just so, and the metal appears to be some alloy of steel, with long scratches in it, dents and deformations and some air holes in its roof. There’s a door with multiple bolts embedded in its front side, but it’s unlocked, slightly ajar even.

From the puffs of breath coming from right behind him, Steve knows Bucky’s following him, so he’s extra careful with pulling the hatch open, inch after inch, slowly, like there’s a beast waiting for them inside (and maybe there is, maybe this is the weapon they’ve been tasked to find, maybe there’s an abomination sewn together from human remains waiting to devour them whole as soon as the door’s the whole way open, and yes, Steve has been reading to many horror novels in his spare time when the others of his squad were playing cards or drinking cheap Italian wine). At least his shield – its blue, red and white paint blinding in the uniform beige-gray of the suite – is up, covering his chest and abdomen. If the need arises, he can shove Bucky aside and buy his men time to get away.

The need, however, never arises. Not really.

“ _Christ_ ,” is Bucky’s sole response to what they find in the metal cube.

Steve simply can’t stop staring.

Huddled in a corner of the cube is a boy. A young boy, barely in his teens, with a shock of peculiar ash-white hair and ribs that stick out in painful bows and curves. All over his body, scars mottle his skin to paint a macabre tableau of suffering, and he has his face hidden in his hands, which are knotted up into fists consisting of nothing but skin and bones. Steve thinks he can feel his heart break at the sight.

“Stevie,” Bucky whispers and attempts to push Steve aside so he can step into the square space and up to the child, but Steve holds his ground, not giving an inch. They have no way of estimating the danger they could be in. “Steve. We have to help him, we can’t just leave him ‘ere. Lemme talk to him.”

“No.”

“ _Steve._ ”

“No, Buck.” Checking behind to make sure neither Falsworth nor any of the other squad members who have appeared in the doorway are paying much attention to what their hands are doing, he quickly grabs one of Bucky’s and gives it a grounding squeeze. “I’ll go in. I’m the one with the shield.”

“You’re the one who’s three inches taller and scarier than me, but sure,” his best friend grumbles and tips his helmet. “Alright then. Off you go, Captain.”

He hears his men shuffling their feet on the tiles when he ducks and crosses the threshold of the metal room. Inside, he’s unable to straighten up, so he remains in a crouch, edging closer to the boy who’s peeking out from behind his fingers by now. His front is drawn, his cheekbones jut out sharply as if he hasn’t had a bite in weeks (which, Steve realizes with a sinking feeling to his guts, is probably the case) and his eyes are a troubled shade of gray, like the sky outside, tracking every move of Steve’s shield which he’s still holding up in front of his chest. The only item of clothing on his body – pants which ride high up his ankles – consists of a linen which is the same shade of drab washed-out white as the whole surgical suite.

“Easy, boy,” Steve finds himself whispering when his subject of attention gets into a crouch himself, as if he was ready to bolt any moment now, though Steve doesn’t know where from the kid would take the strength to even stand. “Easy.” He’s so close, _only a few inches now_ , he thinks he’s almost there, almost able to lower his shield so he can scoop the boy up in his arms and carry him outside and to safety-

Everything happens very fast.

One moment, he’s standing over the child, hearing him cry out in German - “Nein bitte, bitte, ich werd brav sein, _bitte, ich werd’s nicht wieder tun_!” - and seeing him raise a hand, palm facing Steve, and the next he’s being crushed against the steel wall behind him, by nothing else but his own shield.

At first, he panics. It doesn’t quite feel like his asthma attacks back before Erskine shot that serum into his veins, but it’s certainly close. His one forearm presses into his chest painfully, and he thinks he can hear his ribs creaking.

“Steve! Goddammit, Steve!” Bucky shoves past Gabe, who’s descending into back-and-forth negotiations with the frightened boy - “Wer seid ihr? Was macht ihr hier?” and “Okay, look- Wir sind Freunde. Hilfe. Ja?” reach him through the rushing in his ears -, and begins to yank at the shield, but it won’t budge. “Shit, Steve, what did I tell you?”

Talking is getting difficult. “Hrm.” There’s a flush warming his cheeks, and it’s certainly not from the sight of the gorgeous man in front of him. More like from asphyxiation probably. “Three- ugh. Three inches scarier?”

Bucky gives up trying to dislodge the shield and puts his hands on his hips instead, with that You’ll-Never-Not-Get-In-Trouble-Will-You? look he always adopts when Steve is doing something heroic. “Yeah. Three inches scarier to that kid who’s been through a lot. Okay.” He raises his voice and turns to slide Gabe aside so he can kneel down in front of the boy instead, his voice low and gentle, as if he’s talking to a cornered animal – which, in a way, he is. “Kiddo. I know you probably don’t understand me, but let’s try this. You’re obviously doing this to my friend-” He gestures over his shoulder to where Steve is still wheezing under his shield, but he can already feel the pressure on his rib cage abate (Bucky has _always_ had a way with kids, even when he first met Steve, and that’s why he’s still got his kneecaps intact)- “and he’s _obviously_ not happy with the situation. So...”

The boy has flown into a full-on sobbing fit by now. His sides convulse like the fragile wings of a butterfly, the skin so papery Steve is afraid he’ll hurt himself if he curls up any tighter. Then, the pressure on his chest suddenly vanishes.

“Hey.” Bucky inconspicuously checks over his shoulder to give Steve a small nod when he sees the shield is hanging loosely from his captain’s arm again, as it should. “Well done, kid. We’re not trying to hurt you. We’re friends.” Lower and lower his voice grows, so that Steve has to prick his ears to catch the words. It’s like Bucky’s sharing a secret with the boy, a secret only the two of them will confide in. “Everything’s alright. Everything’s fine, yeah? Don’t worry, we’ll take you home.”

The boy’s traits are still twisted up with fright and sorrow when he nods, and there are tears streaking down his face in glistening rivulets. But as Bucky leans forward from where he’s squatting down to take his hand and pull him to his feet, he barely flinches. Instead, there’s a flicker in his eyes, a tiny spark.

Steve recognizes it for what it is: hope.

Bucky ends up carrying the boy all the way through the forest and to their camouflaged truck, because he’s not strong enough to walk himself after all. Steve’s blood runs cold at the sight of his legs jutting out from under his clothes: thin and bone-white like bleached twigs. There’s no fathoming what the kid has been through. He sure wouldn’t want to know if he had the choice.

But as it is, they have to sit the boy made out to be a weapon down on the bench in the back of their vehicle, with Gabe gritting out questions in broken German and the child shivering mutely. His agitation only abates when Steve and Bucky take place at either of his sides and start wrapping him in every piece of fabric they can find: a camouflage shroud, old and musty but still entirely apt to keep the cold of early spring out; Dum Dum’s spare woolen socks he gives up with a warm smile and a remark about how his mother – god bless her – would have been proud to see their use; Steve’s uniform jacket, because the serum keeps him warm through virtually anything. The boy’s cheeks soften as he relaxes tentatively and studies each of them in turn, eyes flicking to the driver’s compartment where Jim Morita and Jacques keep up a steady stream of conversation – even though the by far biggest part of it is Jacques weaseling on in French despite the fact that he should be monitoring the roads for German scouts.

Steve thinks to himself that he must’ve had the best luck on all the continents to have met those men, have the honor of fighting by their side. His heart goes out to the world’s lonely souls who are deprived of friends such as he has in the Howling Commandos.

Finally, Gabe succeeds in coaxing a name out of the boy.

“Erik Lehnshar, or something like it.” His eyebrows are all knotted up when he looks up at Steve for recognition. “Talks about a Doktor Schmidt – presumably not the one we’re after, this one seems like he’s been operating from here for a few months already – who killed his mother and took him out of the camp for experiments. He’s lost time, so can’t tell us how long he’s been on the slab, but he needs medical attention. Said he can, uh, _move metal_ , and that he threw a tantrum to make the doctors flee without him when they heard we were coming.”

“Erik, huh?” Steve’s words make the boy’s eyes flicker over to him, attentively, on guard. He gives what he hopes is a reassuring smile and tucks his jacket tighter around the child’s frail body. “Thanks for translating, Gabe. Dunno what we would do without you.”

“Sign language,” Bucky mutters and pulls a silly grimace. It makes a smile tug at the corners of Erik’s mouth, which in turn kindles an unexpected warmth in the pit of Steve’s stomach.

It’s not like he never thought about having children, back when they were still over the pond and stuck in their daily rut. It’s just that the War has made it difficult to ruminate about anything else beyond surviving. But when he looks at Erik now, who’s carefully taking sip after sip from Bucky’s water bottle, clearly struggling not to throw up after such a long time without fluid intake or solid food, Steve has to admit the thoughts are back. And with them the sneaking suspicion that if they do this right, he mightn’t even worry about being childless for much longer.

They reach the extraction point just in the nick of time. Howard Stark is standing there, beside his invention which appears to be partly hovercraft, partly standard-issue combat plane, and he’s shouting for them to hurry up over the burr of the accelerating engine. Steve scoops their child charge up in his arms, feels Erik’s skeleton fingers dig into his shoulder and arms when he hoists him up into the aircraft, and then they are taking off, the devastated Polish soil disappearing from view as Stark makes for the front line and the safe base which lies beyond.

Curled into Steve’s chest, Erik’s eyelids soon begin to droop. And when Bucky flashes a smile at him from where he’s fastened his seat belt across from them, Steve knows that after all the despair, all the suffering, the boy in his arms has finally found the time to rest.

“With all due respect, Colonel Phillips, we were sent in to recover a weapon, not a child. You can’t expect us to hand him over to your scientists after all that’s been done to him.”

Bucky’s little nod from over the Strategic Scientific Reserve founder’s shoulder, embellished with that smile he has in store for Steve and only Steve, sends a thrill down his spine. He knows he’s not only doing this to get recognition from his best friend, that his first and foremost priority is in fact the well-being of the boy slumbering on a cot to their left, but he can’t help straightening up just a little bit more. Bucky’s attention is something to be treasured.

“Captain Rogers,” Chester Phillips sighs, his dark bushy eyebrows crawling over his forehead like caterpillars, “I know this might sound preposterous, but _you have done your job_. You walked out of there with that boy, and now he is no longer your duty. We will take him from here.”

“Will he be looked after?” Steve glances over as Bucky silently crosses the room and takes up guard at Erik’s side, as if he's ready for a tussle. “You could just send him over to America, to be cared for in an orphanage. I don’t see how he can be of much use to your division.”

Hunkered down on his army bed, Jim Morita sneers up at the Colonel, joining into the overall hostile atmosphere in the tent. Even Dum Dum, otherwise so calm and gentle, has his rifle at a mere arm’s length. The Howling Commandos are not satisfied with the SSR’s order to hand over Erik Lehnsherr, the boy who can bend metal and has been through hell because of it.

“He will be-” Phillips makes a pause to swallow dryly- “He could be of more use than any of you can possibly imagine. The limits to his power have yet to be explored, and were he to be trained in combat and brought to the front lines-”

“The boy _stays_ ,” Howard Stark cuts in from where he’s standing in front of the tent’s flap, his chiseled features hard as stone, machine-oil-smudged hands on his hips. “If you won’t leave him be, if you won’t let him lead a life where’s he’s cherished and cared for, he stays with the Commandos. That, or you can go search yourself another inventor to do your dirty work.”

For a few heartbeats, there’s nothing but the pitter-patter of the European spring rain on the flysheet, painting over the soft snores coming from where Erik is buried under a heap of all the blankets they could rustle up, still as deathly pale as when they first found him in that metal cube. Colonel Phillips stands and stares, gaze hardened as his eyes pin down Steve’s.

“Very well then,” he finally concedes, lips pinched up in an unhappy scowl. “But you make sure this brat doesn’t cause any trouble. And if he does, he’ll have to be… _taken care of_.” Then, his legs stiff like scissor blades, he marches out of the tent, past Jacques smoking his Gauloises, past Gabe cleaning his Swiss Army knife, avoiding Howard’s hard brown eyes tracking his every move until he’s out of sight.

Bucky’s the first to speak up. “Well, boys. Let’s hear it for Captain America, the savior and protector of orphans!” And with that, he gets up and claps Steve on the back, his hand lingering there just a split-second too long for it to be simple camaraderie. “Good job, Stevie.”

The Howling Commandos give subdued cheers, careful not to wake the boy in their midst, and from somewhere under his mattress, Falsworth digs up a hip flask of Single Malt Whiskey to be passed around with murmured jests and pleased smiles.

Howard, polishing the magazine of one of the hi-tech guns they freed from Schmidt, comes to stand at Steve’s left. “It’s good you wouldn’t let them have the kid. There are things going on in SSR even I don’t know about. I’ve got a son, maybe a few years younger ‘n him-” He gestures vaguely to where Erik whimpers softly in his sleep, promptly attracting Bucky who tucks the bedding tighter around the boy- “and by god, as a parent I have to tell you that I wouldn’t let them have my Tony, either.”

“So you don’t think we should attempt to send him to America on his own?”

“Anything could happen on the journey. No, he’s safest with you and your men keeping an eye on him here.” Nodding his thanks, Howard takes a sip from the flask Gabe hands him. “Just take it for what it is: The Howling Commandos have a mascot now.”

They might say the war is no place to bring up a kid. But Steve and his soldiers know better, and by the time Peggy Carter comes to join them, Erik Lehnsherr could not hope for a more caring family.

The boy refuses to stay bedridden for longer than one week after his rescue, even though the on-site doctor has prescribed re-hydration, three healthy meals per day (which should steadily but not too quickly be increased in size) and lots of rest to him. Every day, Erik’s stubborn staring matches with Bucky – who will tuck him back into bed any time the boy makes an attempt at venturing out – will drag on longer and longer, with Gabe unsuccessfully translating their negotiations, until Steve’s best friend finally caves and goes to procure fitting clothes for the adolescent. It’s not long after that Steve sees Erik up and about, quietly exploring in the mud between the tents and army wagons like a shadow who’s had to hide for half his life. Resembling a shy street cat, the boy with the ghostly white hair first shrinks back at any words addressed at him, but when Gabe explains to him the need for cooperation, he stops balking at the Howling Commandos any time they come to collect him after they’ve successfully taken out another Hydra weapons factory and are about to move their camp to the location of their next mission.

In fact, it seems Erik’s starting to take to them. He smiles at Falsworth’s more than dubious jokes Gabe translates for him. He goes wide-eyed with interest when Steve shows him his sketchbook, and then almost faints with barely veiled excitement when he’s allowed to draw some lines himself. And more than once, Steve trips over Bucky humming a subdued lullaby to Erik at bedtime or exchanging anecdotes through wild gesturing and the occasional word in each others’ language, when they think no one is around to observe them.

All in all, it seems Erik makes an excellent mascot.

The kid’s also a quick learner, Steve notes soon, in what concerns both practical and theoretical skills. Peggy smiles in pleasant surprise when Erik says a few lines to her in his broken English, a polite introduction with manners the boy certainly hasn’t learned from the Commandos but must have retained from his education before the second war of this century came about and tore down his life. In reaction to a telegram from Steve, she’s brought with her books on various subjects – English literature, mathematics, the history of the United States and the world -, books which aren’t standard furnishing in the camps only a few miles behind the front lines, books young Lehnsherr will be sat down with by Gabe or one of the other men so they can open up the world to him, despite the circumstances fate has thrown at them.

Five weeks and three stormed Hydra plants later, young Erik no longer needs Gabe translating every second word for him, and his unsettled gray eyes watch the going-ons in the army camp with uncanny attention any time he’s allowed a break from studying.

One strange feature of interest, however, remains: Ever since his rescue from Auschwitz’s labs, the boy hasn’t made a single attempt at moving metal.

So, it comes as a nice surprise when one day, only hours before the Commandos’ next move against Schmidt’s German science division, Steve finds himself looking up from where he’s tinkering with his enhanced motorcycle’s exhaust pipe and spots Erik standing in the tent’s opening, as quiet as a mouse in hiding but eyeing the various metal parts strewn over the workbenches and wooden transport crates with interest.

“Hey, kid,” Steve says and startles the boy into shifting his eyes over to him. “Looking for something?”

“May I help?” comes the answering question, asked with eyes downcast, but Erik’s fingers nibbling at each other betray his eagerness.

Steve smiles in the hopes the boy will catch on with the fact that he’s not, and never will be, a threat. “Sure, buddy. Um.” He hums, casting a glance around the tech tent. “Those screws over there-” He gestures evocatively in case the boy doesn’t have that in his vocabulary yet- “need sorting, by size. You can put them in these boxes, with your powers, if you like.” Recalling Erik’s rescue, Steve mimics the way the kid pushed his vibranium shield away with a mere flick of his wrist.

Apparently, it’s the wrong thing to say. The corners of Erik’s mouth curl downwards, and his steps are hesitant when he shuffles over to the workbench to stare at the bits of metal shimmering in the light of the electric lamp blocking out the falling dusk.

Carefully, Steve straightens up from his perch over his motorcycle’s rear end ( _Three inches scarier_ , Bucky’s words echo in the back of his head). “Hey, uh… What’s wrong? Did I do something, Erik?”

Even as Erik shakes his head – _no, nothing at all_ –, the first tear glitters and detaches itself from his eyelashes to roll down and down, over his cheek, over his chin, a perfect roundel of liquid sorrow.

Steve knows Bucky’s closest to the boy. His best friend’s just too funny and warm-hearted and inviting, so it was never a surprise that Erik would bond with him first thing after opening up.

But Bucky’s not around right now.

Between fits of sobbing into Steve’s arms who is holding him close and shaking like a leaf, Erik tells him the whole story. It takes a whole lot of explaining, what with his – despite everything, still far from proficient – English and Steve’s basically non-existent German skills, but in the end, they piece it together.

It’s a tale of a coin that could not be moved, of a mother shot in front of her child’s eyes, of a boy for whom the sole reason he was allowed to live is that he is gifted. To Erik, it’s clear the Howling Commandos only took him because he can be molded into a weapon to win the War. He’s made sense of the whispered words from Colonel Phillips, from Stark, even from the nice Ms Peggy Carter. He is nothing but his power, and if he uses it, the scientists will come running like blood hounds who have gotten his scent. And that’s what has him so utterly frightened.

Steve decides to prove him wrong once and for all. “Look, Erik,” he says, gently patting the boy’s ash-white hair, “it’s nice that you can do that thing with iron and such. But I know there’s more about you.” He hunkers down so he’s eye-level with the child. “ _We all know._ Wir alle. Verstanden?”

“Understood.” Through his tears, Erik smiles, all shuddery and liquefied, but it’s a smile after all.

“Great.” Steve stands and lays his hand on Erik’s bony shoulder, careful not to put too much force into it lest the boy come apart at the seams under his grip. “Now, I want you to sort those screws, and then, if we still got time- Do you know what I want us to do then?”

Erik’s eyes are widening gradually in his still haggard face, partly with anticipation, partly with fear. Steve regrets to kindle the latter in him. Then, the boy shakes his head.

Alright. Here goes. “I,” Steve says and taps the canvas bag slung over his shoulder where he keeps his sketchbook and pencils, “want to teach you how to _draw._ ”

The smile dawning on Erik’s face then is more dazzling than he’s ever seen it, and by god, at that moment Steve gives the silent promise to coax the same enthusiasm out of the boy any chance he gets, cost it what it may.

The cost in the end isn’t quite so high. With his gift, Erik has to be his own teacher – there are indeed reports of people with _powers_ out there, like the tale of a child goddess bringing down the elements onto the dry and cracked soil of the Serengeti, or the Frost heiress who is rumored to be made of diamond if she so wishes, but there’s no way they can be brought into contact with Erik under the current circumstances. The boy, though, fares well. Soon, he gets so comfortable as to display his powers openly in the workshop, lifting screws and tools and machine parts of any alloy, assisting Howard Stark in easy repairing tasks or helping Steve out with his motorcycles (another passion they both share, as they find out with relish). Bucky is impressed, and so are the Howling Commandos, who resume doting on their metal-bending, art-admiring mascot more than ever.

Yes, if done right, the war is a fine place to bring up a kid.

At least, it is until Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes is once again declared killed in action. For good, this time. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! If you liked it, please consider leaving kudos and a comment. It doesn't have to be anything elaborate (a "loved it!" or "+kudos" would already make my day), but for an author, it's always lovely to see that their writing has touched someone so much that they take the time to type out a few short words (:


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